British Airways Strike Travel Chaos

by Ella FAIRCHILD on March 29, 2010

The British Airways cabin crew on strike are said to have caused 30% of the airline’s flights to be canceled on Sunday, the second day of their 4-day strike. Now that the third day of the walkout is starting, there are threats of another strike coming, while Unite and the carrier argue about how much impact the industrial action has had.

British Airways and Unite have been feuding for months over cost-cutting measures the airline introduced last November. With countless talks ending without a resolution, the union has called two strikes this month and threaten that another is on the way. Steve Turner, a Unite official, says that the row will continue between themselves and the carrier if there isn’t a sensible offer made. However, he added that there aren’t any talks currently scheduled.

Meanwhile, the union is also claiming that the strike has had a big effect on British Airways’ flights, but the carrier says otherwise. They see that less cabin crew support the industrial action than before, while a spokeswoman says that they are running 70% of their long-haul and 55% of their short-haul flights. She didn’t give an exact figure on how many flights have been canceled though.

However, Pauline Doyle, a Unite spokeswoman, says that British Airways had to cancel half of their flights so far. They also claim that the airline is misleading customers by listing flights hired from other airlines on their website as their own services. The spokeswoman added that the union will wait to make a decision on what action to take next until after midnight Tuesday, which is when the second strike wave ends.